Trump’s Iran Buildup Risks Drowning Out Affordability Message

President Donald Trump is investing in one of the largest and most expensive military buildups in decades, just as he touts a promise of increasing affordability at home.

He has sent dozens of aircraft carriers, fighter jets and surveillance planes to target Iran in the biggest accumulation of American firepower in the region since the Iraq War. Trump has warned of “speed and violence” if talks with Tehran fail to halt its nuclear enrichment program.

The Pentagon effort — coupled with the January operation to oust former Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro — could cost billions of dollars and strain military budgets with extended deployments. Trump on Thursday gave himself up to 10 days to make a decision on strikes.

The costly endeavor is a significant shift for a president elected on an “America First” platform that focused on boosting the economy and staying out of wars abroad. Trump risks trampling on his affordability message before pivotal midterms with a high-priced military operation that could trigger assaults on American bases — and plunge the Middle East into turmoil.

“The price of everything is still high, unemployment is still growing, and we've moved on from Venezuela to Iran,” said Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.), who deployed to Iraq as a Marine. “People are going to wonder, ‘Where is the focus of this administration? It's not on my pocketbook, on my checkbook.’ It's focusing on these foreign wars that most Americans are not going to find that [are] directly connected to their interests.”

The president has yet to make a final decision about whether to strike Iranian regime sites or what to target, according to two people familiar with the planning, who say the attacks could come as early as this weekend. Any move would likely concentrate on Tehran’s nuclear and ballistic missile programs, according to one of the people.

A U.S. official said Friday that all military forces will be in place in the region by mid-March. Iran has pledged to submit a written proposal on how to resolve the situation before then, the person said, adding that Secretary of State Marco Rubio will meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Israel to discuss the situation on Feb. 28.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment about the strikes or affordability contrast, but the price tag will be significant. The cost of sending dozens of fighter jets and surveillance planes alone is likely in the “tens of millions already,” said Bryan Clark, a former Navy officer and expert on naval operations.

The USS Gerald R. Ford aircraft carrier and its three destroyer escorts, are about to cross their normal threshold of seven months at sea. If it and other ships have their deployments extended, he said, that will run “tens of millions more.”

This will mean 17 U.S. warships sit in the region, a significant chunk of the roughly 68 warships deployed around the globe, according to the U.S. Naval Institute. In contrast, about 14 ships were in the Caribbean before the operation to grab Maduro.

"It’s a challenge,” said a Trump ally, who like several others interviewed, was granted anonymity to discuss internal conversations. “You can’t avoid the threat Iran poses.”

But the person disputed the weekend time frame, due largely to domestic messaging and Tuesday's State of the Union. “If he is going to act, he wants to get beyond the SOTU so he has a solid window to message his policies, accomplishments and agenda.”

Trump on Thursday raised the stakes with a timeline for strikes, but also suggested diplomacy was still feasible — hours before he headed to Georgia to tout an economic prosperity message.

“Maybe we're going to make a deal,” he said. “You’re going to be, you're going to be finding out over the next probably 10 days.”

Deal or no deal, the costs are spiraling.

The Pentagon, which declined to comment, doesn’t release dollar figures for an ongoing operation. But analysts calculate it has increased rapidly. The added U.S. military capability to the region since late December has already cost about $350 million to $370 million, according to an estimate from former Pentagon comptroller Elaine McCusker, now with the conservative American Enterprise Institute.

The primary driver, she said, is the movement and operation of naval forces, including ships redirected or surged to the region. Those costs stem largely from fuel, transit time, crew operations and moving ships farther or faster than planned.

It normally costs about $1 billion a year to maintain and deploy a carrier strike group, so the costs could add up if the two carriers remain in the region. The USS Abraham Lincoln, now in the Gulf of Oman, was pulled away last month from a deployment in the Pacific.

“The United States has an incredible capability to redeploy military forces around the world, but there are costs of doing so,” said Erik Raven, a Navy undersecretary during the Biden administration. “Longer deployments can also impact readiness, as units will need time to repair and reset once a mission concludes.”

But Trump also has more public backing for strikes against Iran than just about anywhere else. A POLITICO Poll last month found that half of Trump's supporters say “the U.S. should take military intervention” in Iran, significantly higher than other countries, including Mexico, Colombia and Cuba.

And Congress appears unlikely to intervene.

Lawmakers won’t weigh in until next week on restricting Trump from striking Iran without congressional approval. Reps. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) and Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) have said they will attempt to force a vote when the House returns from recess, although the measure is not expected to receive enough backing to move forward.

“Some will say the executive branch can’t disclose their plans by allowing a vote of Congress before an attack,” Massie said. “The Constitution requires a vote of Congress. But I would also remind them that both the Afghanistan and Iraq attacks were preceded by a vote of Congress, and the whole world is currently observing the deployment of U.S. military assets in real time.”

Erin Doherty, Meredith Lee, Megan Messerly and Connor O’Brien contributed to this report.